Sloppy Ground Venison Jerky Help

[Bugnut]

I mixed two batches of ground venison jerky and sadly to say I really screwed one up! I've made hundreds of pounds of this stuff and never made the mistake of adding to much water. As soon as the water and seasoning hit the mixing tub I knew I was in trouble. I finished mixing and stuck it in the refrigerator over night. Took it out and put it in the jerky cannon and it was like pus coming out. So I thought maybe just lay it on the dehydrator racks and dry some water out, wrong! Now it's all crumbling. Any ideas? I always double course grind and was thinking maybe regrinding course with a little water would pull it back together. Really hate to throw it out and really feeling stupid! I guess that's why I usually measure twice!!!

[ragweed]

How about stuffing it into say a 3" casing, partially freezing just to firm up enough to slice.  Then slice it about 3/8", remove the casing and dry.  That's how I make what I call jerky wafers.

[Saber 4]

How about stuffing it into say a 3" casing, partially freezing just to firm up enough to slice.  Then slice it about 3/8", remove the casing and dry.  That's how I make what I call jerky wafers.

And man are they great and easy to make! I've had to use 1 1/2" casings as they were all I had and even they turned out good.

[pikeman_95]

Do you have meat cure # 1 in your jerky. If you don't you might add a tsp. for each 5 pounds of jerky.  The meat cure will help break down the protein which will help it recombine as you dry it in you dehydrator. This might help with the crumbling.

[Bugnut]

Here's how the jerky turned out. Jerky on the left is the sloppy stuff and on the right is how it should look. I had thought about stuffing it but it was crumbly and wouldn't stick together. I ended up regrinding it which helped very little. I decided to give it a shot and used the jerky cannon. The taste is very good but the texture isn't so great. I was about to toss it out and my son came home and tried it and said don't toss it. It did have cure in it already so that wasn't a option.

Lesson to self: Take your time measure twice add once! This just happened to be my first bad batch of anything in about five years. I'll be paying close attention to the measuring cup in the future.

Merry Christmas To All
Tom

[ragweed]

Looks just fine from here.  Glad you were able to salvage it.